Ground Level Rail - Not Much use?

[unmerged(436056)]

Does anyone find ground level rail to be quite useless? It seems overshadowed by raised metro and underground lines as they can go almost anywhere. Even crossing a road you have to raise it to elevated then hope you can bring it back down which doesn't always work.

Not much open space on maps to use it and even then timeline builds on it.

 

[Barkydog]

I do use Ground level Metro on my maps when I'm building in the map editor and making my own cities and towns as I sometimes find it easier to build the ground level metro stations and tracks first then later on build the roads and buildings once the metro track and stations are on place.

I tend to use Ground level Metro on my suburban commuter lines in some maps and have them go underground when the line reaches the city centre. So for me ground level metro is useful but I would say it would be good to have the option of level crossings when you have a ground level metro line needing to cross a road.

I don't know if it helps but there is a mod you can use to allow surface metro trains to use the mainline railway station so that way you have the option of running surface metro commuter lines.

I will admit I've not tried surface metro on the prebuilt maps that come with the game but I do find surface Metro really handy when building my own maps.

 

[TH1]

yeah, i can say basically the same. The ground metro is usually unusable on the maps included in the game, but can be great on custom maps.

 

[giladteller]

Ground level metro is much cheaper than raised metro and underground metro, so I am trying to use whenever I can.
Most of the time, it is very hard to find where to build it, but in almost all maps there is at leaset one area where you can build it.
One example can be on the Helsinki map. It is very easy to build a ground level metro line to the airport, with the tracks going underground when ariving at the city center.
It is also possible to build a ground metro line to the northern airport in Berlin.

 

[slornie]

Also the community in the top left corner of Amsterdam. Buses and trams don't work because they get caught up in the traffic that queues up along the road/bridge towards the railway station. I've found the best way to serve that area is build a ground metro at the top of the community (with a short bus/tram line around the community) that runs across to the canal, and then goes underground to finish at an interchange by the railway station. Building underground the entire way is too expensive, and ive never found elevated metro to be particularly useful.

 

[TH1]

and ive never found elevated metro to be particularly useful.

it can also be useful when you want to take the line between houses instead of just stopping it at the edge of the area for instance. Also useful to cross complicated terrain, like area with roads and railways.

 

[Vercingetorix35]

I sometimes use ground level metro for long distances without crosses. It's cheaper than other levels!

 

[Drag0nflamez]

Ground level is indeed useful when you need to travel long distances between uninteresting areas. and if you see a road: quick: elevated. If I can't find a good place for a ground-level station (like at airports), I just build an underground station on level 1, and have a tunnel entrance pretty close. Or I place an elevated station. Depends on what I feel like. In Tokyo underground is probably the easiest.

 

[Vercingetorix35]

Personally I tend to use elevated metro as much as possible (so I can see my lines ). It's cheaper (a station costs at most 3000 instead of 4000).